Exile and Final Years: 1992–2008

The last sixteen years of Bobby Fischer's life were defined by exile, increasingly disturbing public statements, a dramatic arrest in Japan, and a final refuge in Iceland — the country where he had achieved his greatest triumph. They are the most painful years to recount, and the most difficult to reconcile with the genius who had once captivated the world.

Fischer spent these years as a man without a country — wanted by the United States, unwelcome in most nations, and increasingly consumed by the paranoia and hatred that had lurked at the edges of his personality for decades.

Life on the Run

After the 1992 match in Yugoslavia, Fischer faced a federal warrant for violating U.S. sanctions. He could not return to America without risking arrest and imprisonment. For the next twelve years, he lived a nomadic existence, spending time in Hungary, the Philippines, Switzerland, Japan, and other countries — always on the move, always wary of extradition.

In the Philippines, Fischer reportedly lived with Marilyn Young, who later claimed that her daughter, Jinky, was Fischer's child. (DNA testing conducted after Fischer's death determined this was not the case.) In Japan, he lived with Miyoko Watai, president of the Japanese Chess Association, whom he reportedly married in September 2004.

Fischer had no stable home, no regular income beyond whatever remained of his 1992 prize money, and an ever-shrinking circle of people willing to tolerate his increasingly erratic behavior. He was reported to be deeply suspicious of banks and financial institutions, claiming at various times that his assets had been seized or mishandled.

The Radio Interviews

It was during this period that Fischer's public statements crossed from eccentric into deeply disturbing territory. In a series of radio interviews — primarily on Philippine and Icelandic stations — Fischer made virulently anti-Semitic remarks, ranting about Jewish conspiracies and using language that shocked even those who had long made excuses for his eccentricities.

Most notoriously, in a radio interview on September 11, 2001, Fischer praised the terrorist attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon. "This is all wonderful news," he said. "I applaud the act." He called for the United States to be "wiped out." The statements were widely reported and alienated many of Fischer's remaining supporters and defenders.

The anti-Semitism was particularly bewildering given Fischer's own heritage — his mother was Jewish, and his probable biological father, Paul Neményi, was also Jewish. Some biographers have attributed the hatred to Fischer's experiences with the Worldwide Church of God, which promoted a doctrine called Anglo-Israelism that claimed most modern Jews were impostors. Others have pointed to Fischer's general tendency toward paranoid ideation and his need to identify enemies and conspiracies. Whatever the psychological roots, the statements were ugly, indefensible, and impossible to separate from his public legacy.

Arrest in Japan

On July 13, 2004, Fischer was arrested at Narita Airport in Tokyo while attempting to board a flight to Manila. His U.S. passport had been revoked — a fact Fischer was apparently unaware of or chose to ignore. Japanese authorities detained him, and the United States immediately sought his extradition to face charges related to the 1992 Yugoslavia match.

Fischer spent nine months in Japanese immigration detention — a period that took a severe toll on his health. He suffered from headaches, dizziness, and physical exhaustion. Friends described the conditions as harsh: he was allowed outdoors for only forty-five minutes a day, five days a week. A Japanese official, asked how long they intended to hold Fischer, reportedly replied: "We can keep him as long as we like."

Fischer fought the extradition vigorously. He applied for German citizenship on the basis of his birth certificate father's nationality. He wrote letters to foreign governments seeking asylum. He publicly renounced his U.S. citizenship. Boris Spassky wrote a letter to President George W. Bush asking for mercy for his old rival, and, if that was not possible, requesting that he be placed "in the same cell with Bobby Fischer" and given "a chess set."

Iceland to the Rescue

The breakthrough came from Iceland. A group of Icelandic citizens, chess enthusiasts, and former organizers of the 1972 World Championship match — including Guðmundur Thórarinsson, who had helped bring the match to Reykjavík — launched a campaign to grant Fischer Icelandic citizenship. Their argument was that Fischer's "crime" was playing chess, and that Iceland owed a debt to the man whose 1972 match had put their small nation on the world map.

On March 21, 2005, the Althing — Iceland's parliament — passed a special act granting Fischer full Icelandic citizenship. It was an extraordinary gesture: a nation of 300,000 people reaching across the world to rescue a chess player from the legal machinery of the world's most powerful country. Japanese authorities, presented with Fischer's new Icelandic passport, released him, and he flew to Reykjavík.

Final Years in Iceland

Fischer spent the last three years of his life in Iceland. He lived quietly, largely avoiding the public attention that his arrival had generated. He had a small circle of trusted friends, visited the library and a few regular restaurants, and occasionally played informal chess. He generally refused to speak with journalists or entertain the many business proposals that were pitched to him.

Those who spent time with Fischer in Iceland reported a complicated picture. He could be warm, funny, and intellectually engaging in private — the charismatic personality that had drawn people to him throughout his life was still there. But the paranoia, the conspiracy theories, and the bitterness remained. He distrusted institutions of every kind and carried grievances against the United States, FIDE, and various individuals that had calcified over decades of isolation.

Fischer's health declined steadily. He developed kidney problems but refused surgery and most medical treatment — consistent with a lifelong distrust of doctors that dated back to his involvement with the Worldwide Church of God, which had discouraged members from seeking medical care.

Magnús Skúlason, a chess-playing psychiatrist who befriended Fischer in his final months, visited him regularly at the hospital. Skúlason was careful to note that he was Fischer's friend, not his doctor, and did not offer him analysis or psychotherapy. But from his professional training, he observed Fischer's mental state with quiet concern.

Death

Bobby Fischer died on January 17, 2008, at Landspítali hospital in Reykjavík, from degenerative kidney failure. He had developed a urinary tract blockage but refused the surgery that might have saved his life. He was sixty-four years old — the same number as the squares on the chessboard that had defined his existence. His story was later told in the documentary Bobby Fischer Against the World.

Fischer was buried on January 21 at the small Laugardælir church cemetery near Selfoss, about sixty kilometers southeast of Reykjavík, after a Catholic funeral attended by only a handful of people. There were no grandmasters present, no dignitaries, no television cameras. The boy from Brooklyn who had once been the most famous chess player on earth was laid to rest in the quiet Icelandic countryside, far from the world that had celebrated and then abandoned him.

His estate — estimated at roughly $2 million — became the subject of legal disputes among Miyoko Watai, who claimed to be Fischer's widow; Marilyn Young, who claimed Fischer had fathered her daughter; and Fischer's American nephews. In 2010, Fischer's body was exhumed for DNA testing, which ruled out the paternity claim. In 2011, an Icelandic court ruled that Watai was Fischer's legal widow and sole heir.

A Life in Sixty-Four Squares

Bobby Fischer's final years are the most difficult part of his story to tell — chronicled in full in Frank Brady's biography Endgame. They resist easy narratives of redemption or decline. Fischer was not simply a genius brought low by mental illness — though mental illness almost certainly played a role. He was not simply a victim of government persecution — though the U.S. government's pursuit of him over a chess match was, by many accounts, disproportionate. He was not simply a hateful man — though his public statements caused real harm and cannot be excused.

He was all of these things, and he was also the person who, at his best, played chess more beautifully than almost anyone who ever lived. The tragedy of Bobby Fischer is that the same qualities that made him great — the intensity, the refusal to compromise, the absolute conviction in his own vision — were also the qualities that destroyed him.

← Back to Biography · Fischer's Personality and Psychology →